


Leap of Faith

by A Magiluna Stormwriter (ariestess)



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-05
Updated: 2014-05-05
Packaged: 2018-01-22 00:29:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1569338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariestess/pseuds/A%20Magiluna%20Stormwriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Look, Dee, this is the thing.  You have a choice, but you have to make it right now.  Like before the barge touches the dock here."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Leap of Faith

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pressdbtwnpages](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pressdbtwnpages/gifts).
  * Inspired by [The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide Is Press Coverage](https://archiveofourown.org/works/258845) by [pressdbtwnpages](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pressdbtwnpages/pseuds/pressdbtwnpages). 



> Author's notes coming soon...

"You know, you were never really in competition with me."

Opening my eyes, my vision slows sharpens from the hazy miasma of blood red and gun metal grey that overtook me in the last seconds before unconsciousness took me after pulling the trigger.

Pulling the trigger. How did I manage--

"You need to look at me. Come on, Dee, focus those dark, expressive eyes on me."

That voice. I should know that voice. With some difficulty I finally find the source of that voice. Of course! How could I have mistaken it?

"S-Starbuck?"

"Welcome back to the land of the…" She looks pensive for a moment, but shrugs and grins that irrepressible Kara Thrace smile. "Welcome to the banks of the river Styx. Charon should be here soon enough, but I'm your welcome committee."

"Charon? But he only comes to usher… But you're not dead. You got everyone to Earth, or the desiccated remains of Earth. Good to know that the sainted Starbuck isn't quite so perfect as L-- as they thought."

She laughs at that, a rich, throaty sound that immediately brings to mind the rotgut moonshine and cigars she always traded with Commander Tigh. I can see those poker games in my mind's eye now, playing out in crystal clarity. There were times I actually liked her. Clearly not enough of them though.

"I got everyone to _an_ Earth," she finally says, pulling me from those taunting memories. "I just didn't get them to the _right_ Earth."

"What the frak are you talking about? Right Earth? That doesn't even make sense."

She nods soberly, eyes darkening, and I can see her shoulders slump as if from a heavy burden laid across them. This isn't the way Kara Thrace has ever looked, not even when she was Laura Roslin's personal lapdog and muscled lackey. Something's not right here. And then I start looking around and taking in my surroundings.

"Wait a second! If this is the river Styx and that barge in the distance is Charon's, then--" My throat closes as I realize that's exactly what I'm seeing and what it means. "Then that means I'm dead. But you're not dead. You're down on that ruined husk of a planet, probably getting radiation poisoning like everyone else. Or did the radiation already kill you, too?"

"No, the radiation didn't get to me yet, and it never will. I'm immune." She shrugs then, the corner of her mouth tugging up in a mirthless smirk. "Guess that's one of the perks of being dead."

"What do you mean? I saw you on the ship, on Earth or whatever that planet's supposed to be, we all saw Doc Cottle's report that you're alive and Baltar's machine saying that you're human--"

"For frak's sake, don't believe Gaius Baltar's machine. No, you can believe the machine. Don't believe him. He _knew_ Sharon was a Cylon and lied about it to everyone, including Sharon. But that's totally beside the point right now." She scrubs at her face and glances back, presumably to check on the progress of Charon and his barge. "Look, Dee, this is the thing. You have a choice, but you have to make it right now. Like before the barge touches the dock here. Taking your life like you did should be sending you to Tartarus."

I swallow thickly, knowing this already. I'd wrestled with it before pulling the trigger, but… "I felt there was no other way, Kara. You have no idea what it was like."

She smiles sadly, but doesn't say anything for a long moment. The silence allows me the opportunity to really study her face. There are lines around her eyes and her mouth, lines that shouldn't be on a face as young as hers, Cylon war notwithstanding. There's something different about the way she moves, too, but I can't quite put my finger on it. So rather than deal with my own impending eternal judgment, I latch onto that.

"So if you're dead, why did you keep saying you weren't? I don't understand."

"For the most part, Kara Thrace doesn't know she's a lifeless guardian angel to the fleet. She needs to believe that she's alive, needs to believe that she's got a special destiny to get the fleet to Earth, like she promised."

The way she's talking about herself in the third person is creepy as frak, to be completely honest, and I say as much, too.

"Look, what I'm trying to say is that I'm the part of Kara that knows she-- we-- I died. For the most part, this knowledge has been hidden from the rest of Kara's mind. The Lords of Kobol decided that it was for the best. I was given a second chance to get our people to Earth, but I have to believe that I'm still alive and have a special destiny, or-- Well, you know me. That kind of information would make me want to swallow the barrel of a gun, too."

I wince at her frank words, not that it should surprise me, then shake my head and motion toward Charon's approaching barge with a tilt of my head. "So you said I have a choice to make? I kind of need to know what it is _before_ Charon frakking gets here, you know."

"Yeah, still as feisty as I remember," she says with a chuckle. "Y'know, before Billy…"

"Don't."

I don't want to think about Billy anymore. He occupied enough of my thoughts over the last couple years. Every single time Laura Roslin looked at me, I felt the recrimination. Hell, half the time when the old man or Tigh looked at me, I could feel it.

"If you think about him, he'll be pulled from where he is to deal with this." Her words are soft, but they cut through me. "He got into the Elysian fields. Please don't take that away from him. Hate me all you want, I can take it. But Billy never should have died. It was too soon."

"Yeah…" I clear my throat, trying to dislodge the lump that always appears when someone brings up Billy or how and _why_ he died. "So my choice?"

"Lee loved you, you know. Yes, he and I had something that was-- Well, we had something that doesn't matter. He _loved_ you, still does actually. He just has a really frakked up way of showing it. I mean look at the relationship between him and the old man."

I snort at that, not wanting to laugh, but understanding the understatement of her words. "So what does that have to do with this choice I have to make?"

"Forgive him. You don't have to forgive me, okay? But you need to forgive him. I pushed at his buttons, because I knew how to. He's just a little boy that wants to be loved so much, but he doesn't know how that love should manifest. If you could see how much he's grieving."

"Do you know what he was like when we thought you were dead? It was awful. He hid it from others for the most part, but I saw it all. It was like he lost a part of himself and he shut down. That was when the worst of it started. Then you came back and the affair started. I hope you didn't think I was so stupid that I didn't know about it. Yes, you may have pushed him to it, but he didn't have to leap so frakking readily over the chasm from me to you."

"No, that's true. He was under stress and he did what he always does best, he ran to what was most familiar: me. And no, I'm not saying that he should have or that I really encouraged it as much as you and everyone thinks. But he was always guilty about it, about hurting you."

I can see the barge coming closer. My heart begins to thunder in my chest and I don't want it to ever get here. "What if I can't forgive him?"

"Do you want a chance at the Elysian fields?"

"I took my own life out of cowardice, Kara. I don't have a chance at the Elysian fields."

"But you have a chance at not being in the deepest pits of despair in Tartarus. Don't you want a second chance of sorts?"

"Well, yes, I guess I do, but I don't know how to do that."

"Take a leap of faith and forgive Lee. In the end, he'd still be just as miserable if I'd stayed dead. His happiness has always been tainted ever since Zak died. Zak forgave him. Billy forgave him. He forgave you, too, by the way, if you were curious. Now it's up to you, Dee. Can you forgive Lee for being emotionally weak and needy? Can you give yourself a second chance in the process?"

I can see Charon's eyes flashing now, he's that's close. What should I do? I don't want to spend eternity in the abyss of Tartarus, even if I deserve it for taking my own life. But can I forgive Lee for his shortcomings? Even the ones that hurt me?

"Kara, I--" But when I look at her, there's a sense of defeat about her. She thinks I'm going to refuse because of her. "I just have to forgive him? Not you?"

The implied _I can never forgive you_ hangs in the air between us, punctuated by the sound of Charon's pole dragging in the water as his barge nears the dock. When she nods, I smile and pull the coin for Charon from my pocket, flipping it in my hand once or twice.

"What do I need to do, Kara?"


End file.
